While looking for top controversial stories of 2016, Ringing Bells is probably the first name most people will recall. In case you forgot, Ringing Bells is the company that claimed to offer the world’s cheapest Android smartphone called the Freedom 251. This smartphone was priced at dirt cheap pricing of Rs. 251 only that roughly translates to about $4. For this price, it is sometimes even hard to get some hardware spare parts for smartphones. While there were a lot of issues surrounding the same, it looks like the people who actually went ahead and bought one of these devices are never going to get either the smartphone or Rs. 251 back.

The Ringing Bells company’s official website is down now without any notice. While the reason for the same remains a mystery, the company said that they are still very much in the market and are operating as earlier. In the same statement they also they also said that they are still making efforts to deliver Freedom 251 and so far has delivered around 70,000 units in multiple states across the country like J&K, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, etc. Along with that, a few other allegations were also to rest.The reports about them starting a new venture called MDM electronics has also been cleared. They reported that it is a separate entity and has no relation with Ringing Bells. The company officials said that their target is the low-income people and they are still getting a lot of interest in their product.

At this point, it is really difficult to vouch for the reports which they are reporting since it has been a long time since they promised to deliver the phones. And recently the owners of the Ringing Bells company were summoned by a Delhi court for a case which was filed by a private firm named Aryan Infratech Pvt Ltd. The case was filed against them after a cheque bounce. Ringing bells had issued a cheque worth Rs 2 crore and it was bounced for the obvious reasons. It has been reported that the next hearing for the same will take place April 28th. And this will also join the long list of controversy that we have seen so far about the company. Let us know what do you think about the company and their Freedom 251 smartphone and stay tuned to PhoneRadar for more details on the same.